Sunday 14 February 2021

Advices and Queries

I've read again after some time Jim Pym's Listening to the Light, which includes in its appendix Advices and Queries (the latest, 1994 revision by the British Yearly Meeting), the "potted guidebook to the Quaker Life" as he describes it.

These 42 paragraphs are not categorical commandments to follow unquestioningly ("for the letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life"), but short statements and rhetorical questions meant to make those concerned ponder whether their behaviour is really consistent with the Quaker philosophy and way of life.

Naturally, Quakers being an offshoot of Christianity, their God is sometimes invoked in a way as irritatingly servile as in the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. Nevertheless, there is a lot or really good passages and I'll try to gradually write a bit more about some of these in the coming weeks.



No comments:

Post a Comment